The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1887-06-09
BLOOD ON The BORDER
Prospects for a Renewal of the
Bloody County Seat
War.
Five Hundred Men Claimed to Have
Been Shipped from Wichita
to Lakin,
Alleged to be Hired for Thirty Days
10 0ut-Vots a Rival
Town.
Their Objective Point Suppose to
b Coronado, Leoti's
Rival.

Special Dispatch 70 the DAILY NEWS.
WICHITA, June This evenings
Beacon has the following startling in
formations:
For several days prominent employ
ment agency on East Douglas avenue
has scattered literally about the city
bills and placards to this effect:
WANTED-To give passes to 500 Iail-
road men who want good employment
at 81 so, $l.65 and 81 per day.
Other signs read: "Men wanted to do
street work and to work on public i'm
pruvements in western city"
For several days there has been III
the city a tall, rather distinguished
looking man, evidently of western
origin, who calls himself Col. Bell. 1t
is for him that the employment agency
spoken of has been advertising for men,
although tha colonel hires all his own
men and conducts the examination in
person.
The first question asked by the
doughty colonel is not what can you
dor have you ever worked on railroad
shoVelerl" but chow long have you
been in the slater" Woe to the I'M
luck wight who says he has been in the
state three months or less. If he were
the finest railroad man in the world the
colonel would not want him at any
price. But if the applicant has been in
the state more than year he is all
right whether he ever saw a railroad
before or not. From this it might be
opined that what the colonel really
wants is not railroad laborers, but
voters.
And such is the fact. The Colonel
represents one of those ephemeral
western towns which think its whole
salvation depends upon becoming the
the county seat of its county. Ia the
county from which he comes there is TO
be an election in about thirty days to
determine which of two rival towns shall
be the county seat. The town has
raised purse and sent the colonel on
to Wichita to hire men for the purpose
of sending them to his town in order
that they may out vote the other one.
So far about 500 men have been hired
for thirty days, at wages averaging
Sl.65 per day. The men realize that
they will have no work to do for the
next thirty days, and are jubilant over
the prospect of months loahng ut
good wages. They get free Transports
to and from Wichita.
In regard to the town to which these
men are to be shipped the ''Col." so far
has been extremely reticent. He has
told the men that they are to go by rail
to Lakin, twenty-five miles west of
Garden City, on the Santa Fe road.
From here they will go by stage, it is
supposed, to Coronado, in Wichita
county. This is the town which has
been having the bitter and bloody fight
with Leoti, town few miles distant,
for county-seat supremacy, Several
persons have already been killed there
in this sanguinary quarrel. The influx
of 500 strong men into one of these
rival towns will probably be the cause
for fresh bloodshed and alarm. The
men will be shipped there in small de-
tachments of from five or six to ten
each. A number of men have already
left for the scene of the impending
struggle.
Several men who have been hired by
Col. Bell for railroad and public i'm
provement work" were seen by Bea-
con reporter this morning. They all
understood that they were to go to
some town in western Kansas and vote
on the county-seat question, and that
they were to receive S1.65 per day foI
thirty days, with free transportation
each way, for doing nothing. Col. Bel
has told several of them in strict conf
dence what would be expected of them
and, OF course, the secret leaked out
The men differed, however, as to the
objective point of their journey after
they leave Lakin. Most of them
thought they were to go to Coro-
nado and fight or vote down the
I4eoti folks, but others thought they
were to go to one of the rival towns in
Morton county, either Frisco or Rich,
field. These towns are only two miles
apart and are also raging a bloody
county seat war. In fact the county
lines have been so changed recently il
western Kansas that county seat war;
are the order of the day all through
that section. Each town wants to be
county seat, as that generally secures ;
railroad. The old counties of Hamil
ton, Finney and Ford, have been divid
ed into no less than seven new coun
ties, viz: Grant, Kearney, Haskell
Finney, Stanton, Garfield and Gray
The old county of Finney makes tn
greater part of five new counties. Col
Bells scheme is good one but is liabl
to result in trouble and possibly fur
Their blood shed.